On this day: January 27

2014: Folk singer-songwriter and activist Pete Seeger dies of natural causes at age 94 in New York City. Seeger became a fixture on nationwide radio in the 1940s and had a string of hits during the early 1950s as a member of The Weavers, including their recording of the song "Goodnight, Irene," which topped the charts for 13 weeks in 1950. The writer of songs such as "Where Have All the Flowers Gone?," "If I Had a Hammer" and "Turn, Turn, Turn!," he became a prominent singer of protest music in the 1960s.

2013: At least 242 people die and another 168 are injured in a nightclub fire in the city of Santa Maria, Brazil. The Kiss nightclub was packed beyond its legal capacity with more than 2,000 people when an illegal firework lit on stage started acoustic foam in the ceiling on fire. When the fire raged the crowd panicked, broke into a stampede, and clogged the club's the only exit. The blaze is the third-deadliest nightclub fire in history, behind a December 2000 fire that killed 309 people in Luoyang, China, and a fire at Boston's Cocoanut Grove nightclub that killed 492 people in November 1942.

2010: Author J. D. Salinger, best known for his 1951 novel "The Catcher in the Rye" and his reclusive lifestyle, dies of natural causes at age 91 at his home in Cornish, New Hampshire.

2010: Apple's iPad tablet computer is unveiled by Steve Jobs at a press conference in San Francisco.

2009: Author John Updike, best known for his Harry "Rabbit" Angstrom series of novels, including "Rabbit Is Rich" and "Rabbit At Rest," dies of lung cancer at age 76 in Danvers, Massachusetts. Updike, who was also known for his poems, the Henry Bech stories and the novel "The Witches of Eastwick," is one of only three authors to win the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction more than once. He's seen here in 1989 receiving the Medal of Arts from President George H. W. Bush and first lady Barbara Bush.

2006: Western Union discontinues its Telegram and Commercial Messaging services.

2004: Comedian and talk show host Jack Paar, best known for his stint as host of "The Tonight Show" from 1957 to 1962, dies at age 85 in Greenwich, Connecticut. He had long been in poor health, having undergone triple-bypass heart surgery in 1998 and suffering a stroke a year before he died.

2003: The first 50 selections for the National Recording Registry are announced by the Library of Congress. The registry is aimed at preserving recordings that "are culturally, historically, or aesthetically important, and/or inform or reflect life in the United States." Among the first ones selected for the registry included phonograph cylinders recorded by Thomas Edison, ragtime compositions by Scott Joplin, President Franklin D. Roosevelt's "Fireside Chats" radio broadcasts, Orson Welles' "The War of the Worlds" radio broadcast, the Grand Ole Opry's first radio broadcast, Bing Crosby's "White Christmas," Elvis Presley's Sun Records sessions, Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech and "The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan" album.

1993: French professional wrestler and actor André René Roussimoff, better known as André the Giant, dies in his sleep of congestive heart failure at age 46 in Paris, France. Roussimoff, whose best-known acting role was that of the giant Fezzik in "The Princess Bride," suffered from gigantism and acromegaly, a pituitary gland condition. As a wrestler, he was a one-time World Wrestling Federation Champion and one-time WWF World Tag Team Champion. He was also an inaugural inductee into the WWF Hall of Fame in 1993.

1984: Pop singer Michael Jackson suffers second degree burns to his scalp when his hair catches fire during the filming of a Pepsi commercial at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles. Jackson underwent treatment to hide the scars on his scalp. He later settled a lawsuit against Pepsi out of court and donated his $1.5 million settlement to the Brotman Medical Center in Culver City, California, which later named its burn unit the Michael Jackson Burn Center in honor of his donation.

1976: The "Happy Days" spin-off "Laverne & Shirley" premieres. The sitcom, starring Penny Marshall and Cindy Williams as single roommates who worked as bottlecappers in a fictitious Milwaukee brewery, ran for eight seasons before ending on May 10, 1983. It finished in the top three in ratings its first four seasons, including being the most-watched TV show in its third and fourth seasons. In the sixth season the show's setting shifted from Milwaukee to Los Angeles and Williams left the show two episodes into the eighth season. Despite the departure of one of its stars, the show retained the name "Laverne & Shirley" and stayed steady in the ratings during its final season.

1974: Biathlete Ole Einar Bjoerndalen, the most medaled Olympian in the history of the Winter Games, is born in Simostranda, Modum, Norway. Bjoerndalen won the 13th Olympic medal of his career at the Sochi Games on Feb. 19, 2014, as part of the gold-medal winning Norwegian team in the biathlon mixed relay. The medal broke the record set by retired Norwegian cross-country skier Bjorn Daehlie, who won 12 medals from 1992 through 1998.

1973: A ceasefire begins under the provisions of the Paris Peace Accords, officially ending direct U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War. Col. William Nolde was killed in action earlier that day, becoming the conflict's last recorded American combat casualty. While American involvement in the conflict was over, the agreement only temporarily stopped the fighting between North and South Vietnam, with the war stretching on until the Fall of Saigon on April 30, 1975.

1972: Singer and civil rights activist Mahalia Jackson, one of the most influential gospel singers and known as "The Queen of Gospel," dies of heart failure and diabetes complications at age 60 in Evergreen Park, Illinois.

1969: Comedian and actor Patton Oswalt, best known for his role in the sitcom "The King of Queens" and for voicing Remy in the film "Ratatouille," is born in Portsmouth, Virginia. He's also starred in the movies "Big Fan" and "Young Adult" and had roles on TV series such as "United States of Tara," "Burn Notice" and "Two and a Half Men."

1967: Astronauts (from left to right) Gus Grissom, Edward White and Roger Chaffee die in a fire during a test of their Apollo 1 spacecraft at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. While what triggered the cabin fire was never conclusively identified, the astronauts' deaths were blamed on a range of lethal design and construction flaws in the early Apollo command module. Manned flights in the Apollo program were suspended for 20 months while those problems were corrected. Grissom, White and Chaffee are seen here 10 days before the fatal fire.

1967: The United States, United Kingdom, and Soviet Union sign the Outer Space Treaty in Washington, D.C., banning deployment of nuclear weapons in space, and limiting use of the moon and other celestial bodies to peaceful purposes.

1965: Actor Alan Cumming, best known for movies such as "Spy Kids" and "X2" and the TV series "The Good Wife," is born in Aberfeldy, Perthshire, Scotland. He is also a Tony Award-winning stage actor, appearing in such Broadway productions as "The Threepenny Opera," "Cabaret" and "Design for Living."

1964: Actress Bridget Fonda, known for movies such as "Single White Female," "Point of No Return," "It Could Happen to You" and "Jackie Brown," is born in Los Angeles, California. Fonda is the daughter of Peter Fonda (left), niece of Jane Fonda and granddaughter of Henry Fonda.

1957: Frank Miller, the writer, artist and film director best known for comic book series and graphic novels such as "Ronin," "The Dark Knight Returns," "Sin City" and "300," is born in Olney, Maryland. Miller also directed the film version of "The Spirit," shared directing credits with Robert Rodriguez on "Sin City" and produced the film version of "300."

1956: Actress Mimi Rogers, best known for movies such as "Gung Ho," "Someone to Watch Over Me," "Desperate Hours" and "The Rapture," is born Miriam Spickler in Coral Gables, Florida.

1956: Elvis Presley releases "Heartbreak Hotel," the first single for his new record label, RCA Victor. The song would top Billboard's Top 100 chart for seven weeks and reach No. 1 on the Country and Western chart and No. 5 on the R&B chart. It also became Presley's first million-seller and was one of the best-selling singles of 1956.

1955: John Roberts, who became the 17th chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court in 2005 after the death of Chief Justice William Rehnquist, is born in Buffalo, New York.

1948: Dancer, choreographer and actor Mikhail Baryshnikov, often cited as one of the greatest ballet dancers in history, is born in Riga, Latvia. Baryshnikov, who defected from the Soviet Union to the United States in 1974, earned Oscar and Golden Globe nominations for his film debut in 1977's "The Turning Point." He also co-starred with Gregory Hines and Isabella Rossellini in the 1985 movie "White Nights" and had a recurring role on the TV series "Sex and the City."

1945: The Soviet Red Army liberates the remaining inmates of the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp built by the Nazis in Poland. As the Soviet troops had approached the camp, the majority of its population was evacuated and sent on a death march.

1940: Actor James Cromwell, an Academy Award nominee for 1995's "Babe," is born in Los Angeles, California. Cromwell is also known for his roles in movies such as "L.A. Confidential," "The Green Mile," "Space Cowboys," "The Queen" and "The Artist," and in TV series like "Boardwalk Empire," "Six Feet Under," "24" and "American Horror Story."

1936: Actor Troy Donahue, a male sex symbol of the 1950s and 1960s, is born Merle Johnson Jr. in New York City. Some of his best known movies include "Monster on the Campus," "A Summer Place," "Rome Adventure," "Palm Springs Weekend" and "A Distant Trumpet." He also starred in the TV shows "Surfside 6" (pictured, with Margarita Sierra) and "Hawaiian Eye." He died of a heart attack at age 65 on Sept. 2, 2001.

1922: American journalist Nellie Bly, a ground-breaking reporter who launched a new kind of investigative journalism, dies of pneumonia at age 57 in New York City. Bly, whose real name was Elizabeth Jane Cochrane, was best known for her record-breaking trip around the world in 72 days, in emulation of Jules Verne's character Phileas Fogg, and an exposé in which she faked insanity to study a mental institution from within.

1921: Actress Donna Reed, best known for the 1958-1966 TV sitcom "The Donna Reed Show," is born Donna Belle Mullenger in Denison, Iowa. Reed was also known for roles in movies such as "The Picture of Dorian Gray," "They Were Expendable," "It's a Wonderful Life" and "From Here to Eternity," the last of which won her the 1953 Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. She died of pancreatic cancer at age 64 on Jan. 14, 1986.

1901: Italian composer Giuseppe Verdi, one of the most influential composers of the 19th century and known mostly for his operas, dies at age 87 in Milan, Italy, a week after suffering a stroke. Some of his best known operas include "Rigoletto," "La Traviata," "Don Carlos" and "Aida."

1888: The National Geographic Society is founded in Washington, D.C.

1851: French-American naturalist and artist John James Audubon, known for his efforts to document all types of American birds and for his detailed illustrations that depicted the birds in their natural habitats, dies at age 65 in Manhattan, New York. In 1905, the National Audubon Society was incorporated and named in his honor.

1832: Charles Dodgson, the writer and mathematician who wrote "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" under the pen name Lewis Carroll, is born in Daresbury, Cheshire, England. Some of his other best-known works include the "Wonderland" sequel "Through the Looking-Glass," as well as the poems "The Hunting of the Snark" and "Jabberwocky."

1785: The Georgia General Assembly incorporates the University of Georgia, making the state the first to charter a state-supported university. While Georgia lays claim to the first public university chartered in the United States, it didn't actually admit students until 1801, making the University of North Carolina, which was chartered in 1789, the first public university to graduate a class, which it did in 1798.

1756: Composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, who composed more than 600 works and is among the most enduringly popular of classical composers, is born in Salzburg, Austria.

1343: Pope Clement VI issues the papal bull Unigenitus Dei filius to justify the power of the pope and the use of indulgences. Nearly 200 years later, Martin Luther would protest this with his "Ninety-Five Theses," sparking the Reformation.

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